


circle

by ohwhatagloomyshow



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: Gen, The Black Lodge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-06
Updated: 2015-01-06
Packaged: 2018-03-06 08:23:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3127742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohwhatagloomyshow/pseuds/ohwhatagloomyshow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are moments of blankness, in the running, when he can contemplate his life Before, and people with names like Gordon and Diane and Denise, Henry and Audrey and Andy. He does not see any of these people here, and if time is a circle with no clear beginning or end, then it is clear there is no Before and he has simply imagined them all. There are things that feel Real, like the content of her smile and the weight of a tape recorder in his hand, but that doesn’t mean much in the Black Lodge, because Fear is more Real here, and when he feels it he forgets those other things and can only run.</p>
            </blockquote>





	circle

Time is a circle

(Or so Cooper had once believed, when he had been able to feel the passage of time. All he could feel in the Black Lodge—and perhaps he only imagined it, so desperate for any familiar feeling—was pulsing, like a giant heart).

Time is a circle, and even the Black Lodge cannot avoid this: it repeats and repeats and repeats, no edges and no ending. The dwarf, the giant, Laura, Maddy, Leland, the Doppelgangers, ad infinitum. He does not see BOB anymore but that fact does not encourage him into optimism. They appear and disappear and reappear and he is always running.

There are moments of blankness, in the running, when he can contemplate his life Before, and people with names like Gordon and Diane and Denise, Henry and Audrey and Andy. He does not see any of these people here, and if time is a circle with no clear beginning or end, then it is clear there is no Before and he has simply imagined them all. There are things that feel Real, like the content of her smile and the weight of a tape recorder in his hand, but that doesn’t mean much in the Black Lodge, because Fear is more Real here, and when he feels it he forgets those other things and can only run.

But time is a circle, time is a circle, so he must repeat the same thoughts over and over and over. As the laps add up (but who is keeping count) it is Gordon Cole who keeps coming back.

Of all the Before thoughts and beliefs, Cole is the strongest, because he is the most like who Cooper believes he used to be. There are shallow things he believes like thumbs-ups and hot coffee and large plates of pie but there is also dedication; a strong heart; stability. Gentleness and fierceness, intelligence and compassion, and three letters that are always on the tip of his tongue.

When he has time to indulge the fantasy of Before, he likes to think of himself possessing these things. There is the strong impression in Before that Cole was a mentor, and if time is a circle (as Cole, he believes, had once shouted it was), then he is destined to become like Cole as much as he is destined to help another into those three letters.

It’s always Audrey that appears at this moment; while he can create her name and feel her wide smile, he cannot call up anything else about her. She is the faintest of the Befores and he is not entirely sure why this is, but every time he has a moment to think of her, he creates something new for her. Today—tomorrow—centuries ago—she is curious, she is sharp, she is sad, she is kind, she is scared.

Time is a circle, so then he must be her Gordon Cole. There is coffee and pie and—music. There is strength and tenderness and communication. There are thumbs-ups. There are those three letters that have to mean so much.

Time is a circle so he and Cole and Audrey are variations of the same person, performing the same roles if sometimes out of order. Time is a circle so he must love her as Cole must have loved him.

(This is always the moment when the lights come on, or when the white eyes are replaced with dark.)

Little information remains about Before but love is one of them, and it flavors every creation of Before. Love casts its own circle around his thoughts, and for precious moments, during such scared running, there is peace.

Time is a circle and twenty-five years covers the eternity of life and death. But love is a circle, too, and it motivates the pumps of time within the Black Lodge.


End file.
